Big Gay Fiction & Conferences

I’ve been diving deeper down the podcast rabbit hole. This week I’ve been catching up on Jeff & Will’s Big Gay Fiction Podcast on iTunes. I started out with the most recent (as of this post) episode: Episode 28 – Rainbow Book Fair Wrap Up, 13 Author Interviews, 8 Musicals Reviewed & Lots More I started with that episode since I’d been interested in going to the Fair but found out about it too late to make travel plans, and I’m familiar with a number of the authors and publishers that were in attendance. All in all, I enjoyed the episode, even listening to them talk about things that weren’t in my interests (theater and reality TV) since they’re obviously very passionate about the subjects they cover and it’s great hearing people talk about things that they love. I’ve been going back through from the start now catching up on past episodes, and they’ve definitely got that same passion in every episode. I also like how they shoot a video version of each show (though I’ve been sticking to audio-only since I’ve been listening to it while doing other things) and the notes on their website are great for following up on things they mention.

In one of their past episodes, Episode 2 – GayRomLit Recap, they talk a bit about their experiences at the Gay Romance Lit Retreat, and now I’m thinking about attending this year if I can afford it before it sells out. It’ll definitely be a big expense ($175 for general registration, $375-ish for a plane ticket, over $400 for a hotel room…. ouch!) but I really want to meet some of the authors who are attending and the publishers who might be there. I really liked getting to know people at Rainbow Conference but that’s not coming around again until 2017. I’m still relatively new to the whole publishing industry so I want to learn all I can from the people who’ve been down this road ahead of me. Plus, it’d be great research for my own convention-running plotting.